An Organized Spice Drawer - A Sanity Saver

If you're like me, you consider yourself a domestic goddess.  I often like to prepare "company" food for my family and that often requires spices. I probably have more spices than most but, and I say this truthfully, I use most of them on a weekly basis.  Now, I am also a bit on the cheap side, when it comes to groceries. I absolutely can NOT see the point in paying for name brand when no-name items are produced in the same factory, probably at the same time as their more expensive counterparts.

Periodically, I find myself in the spice aisle and I stock up on the necessary items, the ones in the yellow, no-name bags. If you buy all of the spices you need at one time, you could spend upwards of $100 or more. Now, and this is where it gets fun, I bring the packets home and try and pour them into the little jars that come with most spice racks.  I wish (really wish) that the spice-maker-people would connect with the spice-jar-maker people, because what I inevitably end up with is a spice rack full of jars that are packed to the brim with turmeric, black pepper, basil etc.  What I also end up with, though, is a Ziploc bag of half-full, yellow, no-name spice packets, which I know in that moment are never going to see the light of day.  HOW FRUSTRATING!!

So, when I was designing my current kitchen, I selfishly and purposefully designated one whole drawer to spices.  I purchased glass jars at one of the local dollar stores, pressed my trusty label maker into service and this is what I've ended up with:

and

For those of you who are particularly detail-oriented, yes, they are in alphabetical order and there are a total of 35 jars.  This, and I'm not exaggerating at all, has changed my life.  That should tell you a little something about me!